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Here is a typical example of something that could be either a virus or a genuine email. Except that this is no more genuine than any of the others.There are two things that give this away:1) The text says Click attachment to listen to Voice Message - with the words Voice Message set in title case to emphasise the importance of the matter;2) The attachment is in a zip format, which means you would have to unzip the attachment to listen to the file, (one of the classic ways to package a virus or malware to get it past your Anti-Virus software).The truth of the matter is a voicemail message would normally arrive as a sound file - an mp3 or wav file would be most common. A zip file is highly unlikely, and anyone opening a zip file from somewhere they are not absolutely certain of is simply asking for trouble.

Fake Flash Player update virus

There is a fake Adobe Flash Player Update going round that is actually a virus and is stopping access to Google, Facebook and a number of other sites.

If you see a popup like the one above, DO NOT click on it as it will install the virus and it is very difficult to remove once installed.

Here you can find a few examples of virus emails that you might receive. Although they are shown quite small, you can click on the link below to see what they look like full size. NEVER open an email that you think for even a split second is suspect, it is far better to search the web for the supposed sender, and ring their customer service. Or call us here at TMB.

This does, of course, look genuine, however there are a few things that give it away.

1) Although it is addressed to a specific address, there is nothing in the actual email to suggest it was sent to me personally. That raises doubts immediately. 2) No self-respecting bank would send a receipt via email, especially as they all have very strict processes in place to protect your information. 3) ANY attachment is always suspect, and you should simply not download or open ANYTHING that you cannot guarantee is from the company concerned. Call them, or just ignore it. If it IS important, they will contact you again.

Here you can see although it looks genuine, the senders email address does not look right, and there is nothing at all on the email to suggest it has been sent very specifically to me. No address, PostCode or any other information to tie this email into the delivery address.

This one is even more obvious. 1) The senders address is not shown as DHL but as a 0-live.com account - hardly the sort of address a huge firm like DHL would use. 2) It is addressed to 'Dear Customer' rather than me as a person. Any delivery should have my name on it, or at least they would have made a point of including my full email address. This looks like a generic email sent to nobody in particular - another warning sign. 3) The grammar is poor, as shown in the statement 'so this notify has been automatically sent'. No large company should have an automatic email with poor grammar. 4) It contains a Copyright symbol, plus the word Copyright, plus the year 2013 on two occasions. A little too much. In summary, the email is littered with signs that it is not genuine, and seems to contain just too much information in an effort to convince you it is genuine. On this occasion, my Avast! Antivirus stripped out the offending attachment, which was labelled as a .pdf file but was in fact an executable programme disguised as a pdf.

A sad example of bad spelling

Apart from the fact that there is not even a title to this dreadful example of a poor quality virus email, (and in an almost ironic manner) this novice has miss-spelled Invoice as Inovice. A perfect example of a lack of care. Anyone opening this has obviously not thought about the implications whatsoever.